so. there. are no mean very little. to no. two people are killed and several injured by a suicide bomber who detonated his device at the entrance of the u.s. embassy in the turkish capital ankara. as france declares victory in its three week long campaign against islamist in mali chilling accounts emerged of the human cost of the intervention plus. the realize how

much of a police state the united states has become. torture executive executions and a taste for covering it all up cia whistleblower john kiriakou tells r t why he turned against the agency. was a rocket carrying communications equipment ditches minutes after takeoff in a rare failure for russian u.s. satellite collaboration. it's six pm here in moscow four pm in ankara turkey where we begin this hour and a suicide bomber has attacked the u.s. embassy in the turkish capital killing two people and injuring at least two others the explosive device went off as the attacker was passing through an x. ray scanner at the building's entrance arcee correspondent paul the slayer brings

us details. well the latest information we have comes from turkish police who say that three people have been killed today including the suicide bomber a security guard as well as a turkish citizen who was a member of the staff at the american embassy now according to eyewitnesses there was this massive bang there are also plumes of smoke that have been erupting outside of the american embassy initial reports do say that the blast occurred near the gates of the visa section of the embassy now we understand that all american embassy staff have been taken to safe rooms inside the embassy there are dozens of ambulances as well as emergency personnel at the scene we know of at least one woman who was taken away and who is in we being told a critical condition the police have cordoned off the area they keeping journalists away from the scene this blast did happen in a part of ankara where there are several other embassies including that of germany as well as all fronts now we are also being told that the explosion caused no

damage inside the embassy itself but it did cause extensive damage to the outside wall there are no reports at this stage of any group saying that it is behind this attack and it's not yet clear who indeed did carry out this attack and what their motivation was but i want to mention that there are a number of illegal groups ranging from the kurdish separatists to lift just to islamic militants who have launched attacks in recent years in turkey so you really have a wide range of options in terms of who could have carried this out perhaps it's worth mentioning that prior to this explosion the son in law of assad bin laden was arrested in the turkish capital of ankara you also have in addition to this violence from syria that continuously spills across the border and in the past artillery from syria has killed turkish civilians what that means is that you have a whole host of groups who could be implicated or who could have carried out this attack back in september there was that notorious mission in benghazi in libya

where we had four and then we can start from in those killed include. the american ambassador and then just a few days ago you had bush's foreign office warning of a potential for it against the british embassy in tripoli so what we are witnessing is a chain of events targeting western embassies not least of all the united states that seems to be picking up momentum and it is a reflection of the growing anger against washington and other western countries at a particularly unstable time in the region. let's get more on the blast in ankara joining me now is. also a bureau chief for the turkish daily news paper thanks for being with us was there any hint that this attack on the embassy was planned. i mean we cannot know the exact you know. very recently it's been so it was a it was a male it would be two people i and two or at least two who are injured as you know

we agree on and. so there might be any reasons for such a suicide there one of them being maybe the syrian crisis. are there any other versions circulating within turkey as to what could have been the cause of this attack who is responsible what is the message here. as the u.s. embassy on the start that. the united states. may be in a broadly may be that when. i look at what's happening as you know one one person who would to be it was on the beach or not in on a little has been captured in a non terror out there recently there was some news in a turkish press this morning something good that it might be related to this incident but some other do talk as well as the that it might be a reaction or against. against the image against america and the other

possible scenario of a collision is that as you know israeli air force has made an attack to syria there recently it might be also a. reaction or in fact to the united states an embassy because united states has good relations with israel what kind of public perception among turkish people towards their country's foreign policy and the role that it played in the recent arab revolutions. well there are some mixed feelings. though actually according to all that be right in the turkish press the turkish public seems to be against. all the seas regarding syria they're not of course happy with what the syrian regime is doing but in general there is there is some sort of. this favor against governments all of these which is

a moment also for for the one who so the mosque is reaching its back to that turkey has become somewhat of a hub for radical islamists in the region and accused of harboring islamists fighting the assad regime in syria are you surprised that this attack has taken place. especially in the western press we are reading a lot of stories there that you know turkey has become out of order the weapon and . the weapons and the radical islamist militants are passing through turkey to syria to the war against saddam all says the turkish foreign ministry in turkey there's always unite these claims so actually. i mean back against the the american embassy i can say that i'm not that much surprised because in the past the americans and british specially american and

british. missions have been targets in different terrorist attacks so this isn't that might surprise me at all but the u.s. has acknowledged that its policies in africa and the mideast did result in the u.s. embassy attack in benghazi libya it looks like washington is not doing enough to prevent such incidents what are your thoughts. i mean. i think they're going to go hard but the you know to change perceptions look. first the options is not as easy as it seems because there is this especially after levy everybody believes the looting although in different. units these were going to be a problem brother it was it was other western european countries in the issue so many people believe in the americans there is special in this part of the region there is this general. sort of this they were against america there

it's always that people look or some conspiracy theory is that the americans are behind every if you will open so you can if they are not to it is very different we're going to change the perception although during the obama administration you know i mean comparison with administrations in the past we did a large to sort of. put some dialogue with there with muslims of pleasure with moderate muslims in this region but it seems that there's a lot of way a half. hour bureau chief for turkish daily thank you very much for being with us on the line as the story unfolds in the turkish capital. in other news the first man convicted over america's torture program is now on call waiting to start a thirty month prison sentence but decorated cia veteran john kiriakou played no part in the interrogations he was instead convicted over leaks after blowing

washington's then secret program wide open speaking to r.t. he told us of just what it is he's being punished for. first of all my case was not about leaking my case was about torture when i blew the whistle on torture in december of two thousand and seven the justice to department here in the united states began investigating me and never stopped investigating me until they were able. to patch together. charge and force me into taking a plea agreement and i'll add another thing to when i took the plea in october of last year the judge said that she thought the plea was was fair and appropriate but once the courtroom was packed full of reporters last friday she decided that it was not long enough and if she had had the ability to she would have given me ten years in this post nine eleven atmosphere that we find ourselves in we have been losing our civil liberties incrementally over the last decade to the point where we don't

even realize how much of a police state the united states has become you know ten years ago the thought of the national security agency spying on american citizens and intercepting their emails would have been anathema to americans and now it's just part of normal business. the idea that that our government would be using drone aircraft to assassinate american citizens who have never seen the inside of a courtroom who have never been charged with a crime have not had due process which is their constitutional right would have been unthinkable and it's something now that happens every every so often every few weeks every few months and there is no public outrage i think this is a very dangerous development. but john kiriakou was also a guest on abbe martin's breaking the set here on our t.v. where he told the different of different torture techniques used by the cia also more in his case and the implications in the in-depth interview at sixteen thirty

g.m.t. . do you think that the real people who oversaw codified torture john you alberto gonzales and donald rumsfeld shouldn't they be the ones sitting in prison they should be the ones in there are others even if you just put aside the people who actually did the day to day torture what about the people who conceived of the policy and who implemented the policy where the attorneys that papered over it with with crazed legal analysis or the man who who destroyed evidence of the torture in the tapes. france's president francois hollande is planning a trip to mali to survey what's being held as a successful military intervention against islamist and the french acknowledged however that the operation is entering a tricky phase which is likely to involve guerrilla tactics from extremist

observers say the three week long fighting has spread more havoc across the country with civilians playing a but a bloody price for it we've got the story of one of the victims brought to us exclusively by local journalists gonzalo want to. grosser there are four of us as but the war became a real nightmare for the people of this small city in the se google region it was one of the first places bombed by french warplanes before more jihadists arrived sweeping south towards the capital by mark and the french intervention left a pile of debris and ashes masters the visible traces of the war they left it civilians who were left with the scars that will last a lifetime one family paid a deep price for this conflict against the islamist terrorists one of the family sons was killed by a jihadist soldier inside his own home. one brother was attacked by a group of militants the ridge children among them he started running and got back

into our house but they followed him one of the children fired at him but missed and then another insurgent shot him inside the house my brother fell and was riddled with bullets we laid his body in the house we couldn't bury him because we were afraid to go outside. just because this is just one example of the terror that the conflict is putting mali and civilians through plaguing the weakest the most no one was surprised when india bali once jihadist troops arrived it was discovered that the majority of the military were heavily armed child soldiers. as france prepares to hand over the operation in mali to local troops which are increasingly being accused of atrocities and actually dot com we've got exclusive footage allegedly showing evidence of war crimes by troops there we also have more stories from people on the ground about how they are living through the western led battle against islamists. coming your way later this hour syria's key opposition groups lines israel over an airstrike on syrian territory that's amid fears the reported

bombing could spark a sharp rise in the israeli sentiment among islamic groups in the region. a rocket with communications equipment on board has strayed off course and plunged into the pacific ocean soon after takeoff the company responsible for the launch has said it will look into why it happened for now here's our you go with the latest details. the zenith rocket with the u.s. communications satellite on board blasted off from the odyssey floating platform but to went off course almost immediately and its engines were switched off and it did into the pacific somewhere along the equator less than a minute after takeoff now on the equator the earth's rotation speed provides an additional booster rocket so they could carry more weight when it comes to launching from floating platforms besides looking or some there are advantages and

disadvantages like there's a minimal risk of rockets falling down on inhabited areas but waves could be a problem in fact there's speculation that that could have been the case this time is a collaboration between russia in their gear and to us boring companies they've been working together since one thousand nine hundred five thirty four successful launches well this was supposed to be the first launch in two thousand and thirteen . a grilling in the u.s. senate we gauge the grueling eight hour confirmation assassin of the u.s. to secretary nominee as he appears ready to give as much as it takes to get that job that's coming up after a break. well with. technology innovation all the moves developments from around russia

we've got the future covered. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so for way you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm target market is a big issue. more news today is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. showing operation to rule the day.

welcome back you're watching live from moscow with me and he said now a serious key opposition group has joined the chorus of outrage over what the regime says was an israeli bombing near damascus the national coalition slammed the airstrike on a military research center inside syria as an attack on the country's sovereignty well the government has pledged to retaliate some middle east experts though take the rebels condemnation of the israeli attack with caution because the reported bombing of the site actually plays into their hands. well the main thing right now is to remember that this comes on the heels of systematic targeting of syrian arab bases by the syrian free army and the syrian opposition also i'd like to remind you that the syrian opposition has already thought of the radar station on the edges of the golan heights last year so this comes as

a continuation of the effort to. royd the syrian army by the opposition and now by the monsters themselves by the israelis so what we are witnessing now is a reflection of the political impasse that the syrian opposition as suffering from being unable to achieve anything significant on the ground they have resorted to help from the zionists directly i don't think that the israelis have a policy of making public comments of strikes be it assassinations or strikes that they launch outside the boundaries of international law. there's more news for you on line including on guard that's as north korea allegedly poses martial law urging its army to prepare for war head to r.t. dot com to find out if the korean peninsula is on the brink of military conflict.

and find out all about a city that exists only for six days a year we've got information for you about the russian atlantis that the parts we talked about. serious blows to the reputation of the german catholic church have resulted in more and more worshippers turning their backs on it child abuse and sexual harassment cases committed by priests that don't even get to court are seen as the main reason for dramatically shrinking congregations and you may find some of the details and peter all of us report disturbing. the abuse of trust the destruction of faith the theft of innocence. in one nine hundred seventy nine when i was invited to his house he locked the doors and forced me to drink what i now know was alcohol. he asked me what i thought of his penis which was

a wrecked then you know the priest made me perform oral sex on him. the catholic church in germany is facing a crisis attendances dropped significantly over the past few years according to the central committee of german catholics one hundred eighty thousand parishioners stopped going to mass in twenty ten alone many citing church hierarchies and willingness to do enough about claims of abuse like the ones made by wilfred the priest at the center of this particular scandal is now being moved to a different parish while this church where its alleged abuses took place remains closed to worshippers but just how difficult is it to bring a criminal prosecutor. in cases like this if those people go to court now it's very difficult to get to a sentence because the witnesses sometimes died in between the memory has got lost

and so those attempts to get to have a trial usually fail christian five for had been in charge of an extensive study into abuse in the german catholic church dating back as far as nineteen forty five his research claims that the church destroyed files on priests involved in abuse up to ten years also that twelve hundred victims were paid hush money not to reveal what happened to them he was dismissed after a dispute with xenia close over what information would be made public the scandal that this research is no not going to be finished. is causing problems to them as well now they are losing members because of the new headlines of the last few weeks there are those within the church that recognize the importance of transparency if lapsed catholics are to be brought back into the flock. really even when we do

not make things clear there will always be enough that something is being covered up this will harm attempts to get people into church because it is a bad foundation for trust and all belief is based on trust and. the will for a trust has been lost he says he will never set foot to the church a good he's committed to getting compensation for himself and those others who claim they were abused by people who were supposed to be in a position of responsibility peter all over r.t. germany. look now at some other international news for you this hour thousands of people are marching in demonstrations across egypt against the rule of president mohamed morsi the main rallies are taking place in tahrir square in cairo and port saïd where they are marking the one year anniversary of football riots where seventy four people died the protests come after a week of driving across the country left up to sixty people dead.

there are also demonstrations in iraq or sunni protesters have blocked a major highway in the west of the country protests by the minority group take place most weeks but these appear to be the largest since the end of last year they're angry at what is mainly seen as discrimination against them by the government a group linked to al qaeda has also urged them to take up arms. apologetic poorly prepared struggling to defend his views this is how critics and journalists scored barack obama's pick for the next defense secretary after his confirmation hearing in the senate chuck hagel did his best to prove to the lawmakers that he is on the same page as them during an eight hour grilling or two going to to can listen in on the session. chuck hagel bent backwards to show how mainstream his views are the senators kept accusing him of not being mainstream enough and they kept using the word mainstream over and over again during this hearing chuck hagel has walked back on a number of positions he had taken earlier he kept apologizing again and again and

chuck hagel went to great lengths to show that he is in no way going to challenge washington's core foreign policy beliefs as one of the senators put it it was quite an exhausting hearing considering the senators were asking almost the same questions and roughly eighty percent of them had to do with chuck hagel previous statements on israel and iran there was so much mentioning of israel that at some point they were confirming him as secretary of defense for israel i couldn't count how many times he said all options are on the table with regards to iran again and again saying a strike on iran is an option an option that he had previously called irresponsible by the way here's what chuck hagel was heating throughout the hearing get the united nations behind you get the international sanctions behind you keep military options on the table if the military option is the only option it's the only option one of the senators pointed out during the hearing that in a private conversation senator hagel recently told him that he thought sanctions

they didn't work and previously chuck hagel voted against sanctions but today's chuck hagel as we found out during this hearing is for sanctions to those who believe mr haye go was in favor of direct negotiations with iran as he had previously claimed he was he offered a correction a very vague one he tried to blur his response as much as he could here's what he said i don't have a problem with engaging i think great powers engaging in gage and is clearly in our interest that's not negotiation engagement is not appeasement engagement is not sure under so no direct negotiations with iran here's another example of how chuck hagel had to walk back on some of prevents this. statements at one time he said and this has become a famous quote the political reality is that the jewish lobby intimidates a lot of people up here i've always argued against some of the dumb things they do because i don't think it's in the interest of israel and of quote here's chuck

hagel during this confirmation hearing he noted that i. did i should have used another term and i'm sorry and i regret i mean the use of intimidation. i should have used influence. i think would have been more appropriate i should not have said dumb or stupid. because i understand appreciate there are different views in these things it was like torture watching the hearing because it seemed as if the senators were not there to question chuck hagel but they were there to break him because they kept going back to his previous statements and pushing and pushing until he said what they wanted to hear and he did it so whoever thought chuck hagel was going to offer a new outlook on u.s. foreign policy after this hearing would seriously doubt that. now here at r.t. we're always interested to know your view on all of the issues we're covering but today we're focusing on chuck hagel and why his stance has become more hawkish so

to say log on to our tea dot com this is so far what some of our viewers think in terms of his new stance this must percent say that he is really changing that it's a genuine change in position this foreign policy on iran about twenty percent say it's a ploy to counter criticism of being anti israeli we heard about that from going to in washington of thirty or so say it doesn't matter he won't have any influence on iranian policy that it will be the same no matter who's in the position it'll be the public policy of the white house and finally the largest amount of you believe that it just proves his own claim but no one can stand up to the jewish lobby given that was of course his claim before he was being grilled on the position of secretary of defense well that wraps up our our news this hour crosstalk is next here on our t.s.a.

with me. you know i can kind of sort of understand the mindset of an evil dictator i have trouble understanding what is going on or maybe not going on in the minds of the terrified cogs who believe all the propaganda give up all their rights for the illusion of safety to coach jerry seinfeld who are these people well maybe some of them maybe working at your local school bring good bureaucracy zombies at the pennsylvania school suspended a kindergartner note kindergartner as a terrorist threat because she threatened to shoot another student with a gun that shoots soap bubbles i guess this was all a mix up because the girl she wanted to shoot didn't understand that it was in reference to bubbles and not bullets children in kindergarten can often misunderstand things but the administration of the school seems to be.